


Late Afternoon Sunset

by Timeskipped



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Platonic Relationships, but it's really just misukazu on the roof, the rest of summer troupe + madoka are mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-16 08:27:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29204334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Timeskipped/pseuds/Timeskipped
Summary: Summer Troupe is welcoming him with open arms, and it’s not that Misumi doesn’t like it (because he loves it, adores it, would die for more of it) but rather because Misumi isn't used to this kind of friendship.He’s not triangular enough for them. Kazu, especially.
Relationships: Ikaruga Misumi & Miyoshi Kazunari
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	Late Afternoon Sunset

The roof is quiet. Finally.

It’s like Misumi won’t stop buzzing. He’s too nervous to sit in his room, even surrounded by comforting triangles. It feels like any minute, someone will burst in and tell him— _weirdo_ —what are you _doing_ —something awful. It scatters in Misumi’s chest, tightly, like the worst kind of anticipation.

“You’re just awesome,” Kazu had grinned, his smile lopsided and wide, “I could be around you forever, y’know? Feels like I’m always smiling around you.”

Misumi hadn’t been able to stop smiling since then. Running, jumping, backflipping—those words gave him the energy to do anything.

Misumi has been happy these last few days with Kazu and the rest of Summer Troupe. Even as Yuki and Tenma keep fighting, and Tenma is still overly harsh sometimes. Tenma reminds Misumi of someone who hasn’t quite found his footing yet, his rejections softening since the training camp. Sometimes, Muku mumbles self-hatred, and Tenma is the first one by his side, rejecting those thoughts.

They extend the same sort of kindness to Misumi, too.

 _That_ is not usual for Misumi. He’s more used to _this,_ breathing in the cool late afternoon air and wondering if any of it really matters, if he’s even going to be able to be friends with any of them for much longer.

They’re welcoming him with open arms, and it’s not that Misumi doesn’t like it (because he loves it, adores it, would die for more of it) but rather because it’s making him unstable, a triangle with one side too short and another too long. Misumi is on the edge of the roof, and none of them know that Misumi is anxiously waiting to fall apart.

He’s not triangular enough for them. Kazu, especially.

He knows that they’re going to get tired of him, eventually. He knows more than anything, even as he draws triangles everywhere to make things better, that something about him is so unbelievably broken that he’ll never be able to repair it. Kazu’s going to look at him and stop smiling. And maybe that’s unrealistic, with how Kazu smiles for everyone, but _that’s_ important, too.

Kazu is full of love to give, more than anyone else Misumi has ever known. It’s as amazing as it is scary.

Misumi hadn’t had friends in school, but he’d had people who thought for even just a single moment that he was fun. That was the kind of thing that Misumi clung to, those small moments where his triangles _meant_ something. Until, suddenly, he wasn’t fun anymore. When Misumi stopped going to school, there was emptiness and hollow places where Misumi thought he’d seen those people; he looked again, and they weren’t there at all.

Kazu would never leave him like that. But he _will_ leave. He’ll understand that Misumi has never had something quite like this, and Misumi won’t be able to repair it. He won’t be able to make the triangles the correct proportions again. Isosceles to equilateral isn’t easy enough to change, Misumi knows.

He’s happy for now. He wishes that was enough for him.

Kazu has a lot of friends, regardless. He’s surrounded by people who make him smile, who are everything compared to Misumi, who somehow keeps getting everything _wrong._

“Sumi? Is that you?”

Misumi starts, freezing in place. It travels in shivers down to his fingertips, which grip the edge of the roof as he thinks _please not right now._ He stays silent, drawing into his shell. He thinks about nice things, like the onigiri in the fridge, the onigiri he’d wanted to eat with Summer Troupe, the onigiri he’d wanted to eat with Kazu—

“Oh, it _is_ you, Sumi!” Kazu breathes out heavily, then in again as he pulls himself onto the roof. “Are you having fun up here? Wow,” he grins as he looks out, at the sun barely gone from the sky, staining the clouds orange, “it’s breathtaking up here. Major props for finding this place!”

Maybe if Misumi was an artist like Kazu, he’d be able to draw this scene, a precious new friend with a bright smile against the long shadows.

Kazu settles beside him, leaning against his side. “You’re amazing to be able to climb up here without getting tired, Sumi!”

Misumi smiles, because he thinks that’s a thing to smile at. And he _is_ happy about the compliment, but… Something aches inside of him.

“Sumi?”

Misumi realizes with a jolt that he hasn’t spoken to Kazu at all yet. The words feel like they’re sour on his tongue, or like it’s twist itself up into asking Kazu to leave, when really all he wants is for Kazu to stay, stay, _stay._ Is that greedy of him? To want this much from someone who would give it to _anyone?_

Misumi wants to be special, and Kazu makes him _feel_ special, but after so long of being afraid of _this,_ he doesn’t know how to ask why Kazu is being so nice to him when he doesn’t have to be.

“Hi, Kazu,” Misumi says, instead of anything meaningful. If it was Kazu in his place, maybe something would _happen._ As it is, Misumi feels frozen still.

“Are you okay?” Kazu’s eyes are large this close up, flickering every which way in an attempt to figure out if Misumi is alright. His hand twitches towards him, and then stutters to standstill. Kazu’s voice is so soft and serious, and normally Misumi would nod and pretend he hasn’t been hating himself alone.

He shrugs, pulling his lips into a small smile. “I’m scared, Kazu. That things will go wrong.” He’s scared of Mankai company going under, or of Tenma going back to being snappy and calling Misumi a weirdo, and it won’t even hurt because it’ll be true, or that Muku will get bored with getting given triangles for a job well done, or Yuki won’t reach out for Misumi if he hides himself—because Yuki is kind underneath the way he complains, but he’s also not used to being surrounded by kind people—

He’s scared that Kazu won’t do anything. He’s scared he’ll go back to being alone simply because he expects as much, because he wasn’t able to treasure these moments with Kazu enough. That he won’t be what Kazu _wants_ or _needs._

“It’s okay,” Kazu is saying, but Misumi can’t see him because suddenly his eyes are watering. “We won’t let anything happen to Mankai! Haven’t we already come this far? And, besides,” Kazu wraps his arm around Misumi’s back, rubbing his arm with calm, gentle movements, “you’re our MVP, Sumi! We need you!”

“MVP?” Misumi asks, muffled in his sweatshirt as he hides his face.

“Yep! MVP stands for most valuable player, which is you! I don’t want you to be scared, because you matter to me. And to Mukkun and Tenten and Yukki, too! You’re here at Mankai to be with us, and to have a good time,” Kazu’s voice becomes so soft that Misumi forces himself to look up again, at his face, as he finishes, “and to smile. You don’t have to smile right now, but I like it when you do.”

“I like it when you smile too,” Misumi says, and something is pulling inside of him. Tears are rolling down his cheeks, and he forces his breath not to hitch with a sob. “I want to make you smile, and I want you to make me smile.”

“That’s good,” Kazu says. “I’m not good at being, you know, open or anything, Tenten was right about me, but—thanks.”

Misumi sniffs, curling in on himself but keeping his eyes on Kazu. “I’m doing something wrong,” he says, miserably, heavy, like the way Madoka frowned at him. Like the feeling of not having a home. “I don’t want to lose this. I don’t want you to leave.”

“You’re not doing anything wrong, Sumi!” Kazu bites his lip. “And you’re important to me, so I won’t leave. You’re so _you,_ Sumi, that I feel I can be _me._ So, I think it would be nice if we made a promise.” He removes his arm from Misumi’s back, only to offer it to him like a handshake. “If Mankai shuts down, we’ll totes still be friends, okay? Sumi, there’s nothing to be scared of. You’re unstoppable!” Kazu is so good like this, shining against the fading oranges and pink of the sky, beauty packed into one person and overflowing everywhere.

Kazu’s smile is a triangle, so Misumi shakes his hand. He smiles, too, maybe not as wide as he had before this meeting. “Kazu…” Tugging on Kazu’s hand, Misumi pulls him in for a loose, quick hug. “Thank you! Thank you, thank you! I’ll give you my onigiri!”

“Wahh—Thanks, Sumi, but that’s yours, isn’t it? I’ll make some with you next time!”

But that’s not enough, Misumi thinks—Kazu is too good for him, in every way possible, unfreezing Misumi’s limbs and calming his heart. Misumi wants to give Kazu and the rest of Summer Troupe every single triangle he has, until they understand how special they are.

Misumi’s still scared, but he thinks he understands, now. “Okay,” he says, pulling back and beaming; this time, his smile is looser, easier. He wipes his tears with one sleeve. “I’ll get you a different triangle, then!”

“Thankies!” Kazu says, and leans against him more fully, arm around his shoulder again. “I’ll paint you something, too, if you want!”

Misumi falls quiet. Kazu’s head shifts until it’s resting in the crook of Misumi’s neck.

“Can you paint the sunset?” Misumi says, eyes tracing the clouds, at the way the orange hits them. “And a lot of triangles, too!” He wants something to come of this moment, and if Kazu is offering to draw like this…

“Of course!” Kazu says.

Misumi breathes in, then out again. Then a second deep breath, and a third, to make it more triangular, like he did when he was learning how to parkour. Building up to something larger.

What’s larger than Misumi, right now, sitting on the roof with the first friend he’s ever had, is the fact that Misumi is still scared. He’s terrified, but his chest isn’t quite so tight, and he believes, with all the warmth filling his chest now, that Kazu will at least try not to leave him. He doesn’t know if he’ll find himself up here alone again, buzzing with something bad and _wrong,_ but at least he has this; a memory of a sunset, and a triangular friend.

When Kazu gives him a painting of a sunset, a triangular rooftop, and two silhouettes, it feels like a promise. Misumi smiles as he passes Kazu another onigiri, and hopes he never stops smiling.


End file.
